It all started for me many moons ago, before a date I can solidly identify. I had a hideous orange plastic box that had formerly enclosed a kit of play-doctor toys. When the toys ceased to be a source of fun for my young imagination, they were disposed of and the box became the sacred receptacle for my prized "rock collection". Over the years, the collection grew, piece-by-piece. Birthdays, Christmas, and other gifting occasions would contribute to the precious caboodle. Often, I would open the box and pull out the contents, one mineral at a time, carefully examining each one, admiring its characteristics and applying my perceived value to them.
When I was 15, my family went on a camping adventure over the North Cascade highway. We took a day hike in the glorious alpine wilderness, that brought us - unexpectedly - to an abandoned mine tunnel. I scrambled up the heap of exhumed rocks that spilled forth from the open mine, but knew not to enter the aged tunnel. Sliding on my heels, I descended the crumbling pile and something bright caught my eye amid the dusty rubble. I snagged it as I slid past and when I opened my hand at the bottom, I realized I had found a rather large chunk of flashy golden pyrite. It was thrilling to have found my very own specimen, but it would be years before I realized I could turn that fascination into a hobby.
Unfortunately, my original mineral collection is no longer intact, though I still have the very first "crystal" that was given to me by my father when I was 7 or 8 years old - a small rose quartz marble that I picked out as my favorite during my first visit to a crystal shop in Seattle.
More recently, my partner Daniel and I began a collection of our own, acquiring crystals from friends, local gem shows, crystal shops, and dealers. While driving through Oregon on a road trip, we passed by a shop called Crystal Kaleidoscope. Enchanted by their display of large crystals - visible even from the highway - we promptly pulled over and spent the better part of 2 hours and the remainder of our trip funds on a diverse collection of crystals, minerals, fossils, and meteorites. It was just the beginning...
Acquiring new specimens is always a great deal of fun but it wasn't until Daniel and I were hosting a traveling Gem dealer that I realized there was more to collecting than just buying pretty things. Intrigued by an unusual formation, we purchased a large slab of raw crystallized hematite. I'd never seen anything like it and the price was more than fair. On the back of the heavy stone was the name and location of the mine from which it had come. That was when it occurred to me that rocks, crystals, and minerals don't just appear in display cases and personal collections - they come out of the ground, from very specific places. They are, by definition, a geologic history of the place from which they came. They tell the story of the earth and the chemical make-up and the vast geological forces that all came together to create something unique and very often beautiful. I then realized that I could be the one finding these treasures in nature. I could go to the place where they were made and smell the soil and see the trees and the landscape that has been their home for millions of years.
More than owning them and enjoying their beauty, I realized I wanted to use my own hands to extract them from the earth and clean them off and bring them to light.
While on a summer camping trip last year, Daniel and I were sitting by the fire. In the deepening dusk, an excited couple joined us. They were wearing headlamps and carrying toothbrushes and a large plastic dish pan. They had just spent the afternoon hunting for crystals and returned with a pail-full of large druzy plates. We watched as they scrubbed the mud from the freshly collected crystals and I quizzed them up and down about where we could go to find such treasures.
I've learned that vaguery is the best one can expect from such queries. The most information I could get out of them was "a couple of miles down the road" followed by a casual sweep of the hand in the general direction of West. When we returned home a few days later, I eagerly studied maps of the area, using the clues of "a couple of miles" and "that way". Bouncing back and forth between Google Satellite and MyTopo.com (which has searchable maps of the entire US, complete with keys that outline prospecting and mining areas), I realized that Seattle is a rockhound's dream. The Cascade range is teeming with mineral deposits, fantastic crystal hunting and gold-panning opportunities.
Over the summer I spent countless days scouring maps and researching via the internet. It didn't take us long to identify several near-by crystal hunting areas, which we visited regularly during the summer of 2012.
This blog is intended to catalogue our subsequent travels and rock-hounding adventures, as we dig deeper into our passion for minerals, crystals, and breath-taking hiking opportunities.
If you are interested in perusing our collection of mined-by-hand crystals, feel free to check out our store: HoundsofApollo on Etsy.com
Thanks so much!
~ Lola Ocian and Daniel Hensley
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